The New Verse News presents politically progressive poetry on current events and topical issues.
Guidelines
Submission Guidelines: Send 1-3 unpublished poems in the body of an email (NO ATTACHMENTS) to nvneditor[at]gmail.com. No simultaneous submissions. Use "Verse News Submission" as the subject line. Send a brief bio. No payment. Authors retain all rights after 1st-time appearance here. Scroll down the right sidebar for the fine print.
James Schwartz is a Detroit based poet and author of various poetry collections, most recently Amish Alchemy (Alien Buddha Press, 2026) and Poems 2 (with Sourav Sarkar, 2026).
James Schwartz is a Detroit based poet and author of various poetry collections, most recently Amish Alchemy (Alien Buddha Press, 2026) and Poems (with Sourav Sarkar, 2026).
James Schwartz is a Detroit based poet and author of various poetry collections including The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America (2011) and most recently Big Island Beatnik: Poetry & Photography from the Lower East Rift Zone (Alien Buddha Press, 2025). queeraspoetry.bsky.social
"For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast." —Ephesians 2:8-9
Prayers heard
Or unheard,
Spiritual delusion
Per authorities,
Summer's end
She could not,
Walk on water
As the voices,
Had commanded
She had failed,
He had failed
A test of faith,
As the voices
Grew louder,
After the lake
Recieved them,
Highly emotional
Surfacing diver,
As the voices
Grew louder.
Submerged prayers for
A salvation.
Cast into
Empty horizons.
Authors Note: The Amish communities can have a lack of access to professional mental health care and resources. Two mental health crisis resources are 988 and www.nami.org. My condolences to all affected by this tragedy.
James Schwartz is a poet and author of various poetry collections including The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America (Kindle, 2011) and most recently Big Island Beatnik (Alien Buddha Press, 2025). @queeraspoetry.
America's famously private Amish people are unreachable by phone or email and refuse to have TVs in their homes. But that didn't stop members of the conservative Christian group turning out on polling day in a trend that appears to have helped Donald Trump win Pennsylvania. —MailOnline, November 6, 2024
I'm walking down Piquette,
& John R.
Past abandoned Harris-Walz signs,
& ochre brickwork,
On a crisp afternoon,
After the election
In Motor City,
Coffee & Sugar Sweet Donut ™
In hand,
Heading to work,
Past the
Construction workers,
Who shout,
Over their machinery din,
"What theelection?!...
I'll tell you what happened with the election...
The Mexicans & those racist ass
Amish people!"
Their laughter,
Carried by the wind,
In our coming Amish Golden Age,
Or
Old Order Apocalypse.
James Schwartz is a Detroit based poet and author of various poetry collections including The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America (2011), Punatic (2019), Motor City Mix (2022) and most recently Some Are and Most Aren't and It's Always Been Like That: Selected Poems 2004-2024 from Alien Buddha Press. @queeraspoetry
Gleefully proclaiming the joys of rock ‘n’ roll, drugs and sex in the streets, John Sinclair reigned as a nationally celebrated troubadour of youth rebellion during the psychedelic era, playing a lead role in making Detroit and Ann Arbor counterculture hot spots with the MC5 band, the White Panther Party, cutting-edge concerts and flamboyant rhetoric. Sinclair, who lived in Detroit, died Tuesday after years of declining health. —Detroit Free Press, April 2, 2024. Photo: James Schwartz and John Sinclair
A few years ago at a reading,
John Sinclair is discussing where he will be buried—
Flint or Detroit,
I chime in,
Rome by Keats,
That makes John smile,
He made me smile as well,
When he told me:
You're lucky to have escaped the Amish!
Rest in power poet.
James Schwartz is a Detroit-based poet and author of various poetry collections including The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America (2011), Punatic (2019), Motor City Mix (2022) and most recently two novellas Sunset in Rome (2022) and Long Lost Friend (2023) from Alien Buddha Press. @queeraspoetry
Now, some Amish across northern Ohio find themselves clashing with a new state law designed to reduce accidents and enhance traffic safety by requiring flashing yellow lights on Amish buggies and other animal-drawn vehicles. …officers have been issuing citations, and some Amish have been summonsed into courts across northern Ohio on minor misdemeanor charges punishable by a roughly $150 fine. In Ashland County, some Amish are citing their religious beliefs and have told a judge they don't plan to obey the law and that "paying a fine is not an option." —The Daily Record, November 18, 2022
Memories of Monarch butterflies amid spring songs, clover flowers behind the old weatherbeaten shed, the Gregorian-esque voices in praise, the harmonies to heaven, the crisp white shirts, stark black pants & dresses, descendants of martyred interpretations, heretics of our own making, motherless rebels inter-bred in a defiant democracy. We will not guard the Holy Father. We hustle our humble wares amid warfare, bloody handed Bishops playing God, #AmishTikTok survivors. The sinful government wants to lower the body count. Ohio Bishops flex, above the law, statistics be damned, warning signs on dark roads & lost harmonies to the Lord.
ElectReon, a wireless and in-road wireless electric vehicle charging technology company, will deploy its first public wireless EV charging road system in Michigan… ElectrRon's charging infrastructure can wireless charge EVs while they are in motion and stationary. The company said it is the first in the world to be successfully demonstrated on public roads. —WXYZ Detroit, February 2, 2022
James Schwartz is a poet, writer, slam performer and author of 5 poetry collections including The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America. Twitter: @queeraspoetry
We are not equipped to process this level of grief, the news anchor sighs. Video plays of the President, First Lady, VP and Second Gentleman surrounded by candles.
500,000.
A statistic surpassing wartime numbers. The day will come, President Biden promises, when the memory of our loved ones will bring a smile before a tear.
500,000.
We are an illumination in this dark stillness. One morning we will smile at the empty chair. One morning we will smile.
James Schwartz is a poet, writer, slam performer and author of 5 poetry collections including The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America. Twitter: @queeraspoetry
When Andrew Yang dropped out of the presidential race a month ago, he couldn't have possibly anticipated the centerpiece of his platform — universal basic income — would be the bipartisan solution that Republicans and Democrats in Washington are rallying behind amid the coronavirus crisis. “Certainly I would never hope that UBI gets adopted because of this terrible virus. But I will say it's somewhat surreal to suspend my presidential campaign in February and see it potentially implemented in March,” Yang told [The Washington Post] in an interview on Tuesday. Photo: Andrew Yang speaks during the third Democratic primary debate of the 2020 presidential campaign. (Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images)
They kicked around the idea in Switzerland,
MLK was for it, in the days before coronavirus,
Andrew Yang then bringing the tool back,
They sneered it wouldn't work, of course,
They questioned how it would be paid,
For, and by whom: not them to be sure,
Now that we're quarantined outside the box,
They iron out the details of a UBI,
Rebranding themselves as saviors,
Credit where cash is due.
James Schwartz is a poet, writer, slam performer and author of 5 poetry collections including The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America. Twitter: @queeraspoetry
James Schwartz is a poet, writer, slam performer & author of 5 poetry collections including The Literary Party: Growing Up Gay and Amish in America. Twitter @queeraspoetry
